Scuttling Neutral Mines

from Sins Forums

I've been told that the developers never intended for this to be a part of the game, but you can scuttle neutral mines. Personally, I like what this does to the game. It adds a whole new dimension to Vasari.

TEC and Advent tend to only have access to a few neutral mines that are close by because their colonizer has to actually make it there. Vasari, however, use scouts that have no problem getting to mines on the other side of the map, so this brings new strategic elements.

Early game Vasari can have 10+ neutral mines on a random map and just go to town with the monstrous economy. What I've come to enjoy doing is if I'm Vasari and I see that my enemy is moving for a neutral mine that I took in his territory, I'll scuttle it. Good players understand the huge impact neutrals can have on gameplay b/c the impact of them on early game economies is huge, and great in later economies.

Scuttling a neutral may seem like a bad idea, but if it's in enemy territory, that means your enemy is the most likely to keep that mine. You may get it everyonce in a while, but you can't waste your time keeping after that. Just scuttle it and hurt their eco. :P

strategy
4,760 views 11 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
That's really good info, I hadn't even figured out how to claim them with the Vasari, both games I played as them I just left the mines unclaimed and guarded when I could. This helps me on two counts - Thanks.
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Definitely sounds like a bug :P They're marked "invulnerable" for a reason ;)
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
thats been fixed since 1.04 i think.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
has not been fixed. Cykur did it to Raging I believe, or the other way around? Either way, I think it's more of an exploit than a viable strategy. :p
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
so it destorys the mine itself? that cant be right. if you could destroy the mine, the you destory mines at planets too. sounds like a bug to me. most likely they expected the neutral mine to act the way a planet mine would and it didnt.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
Amish did it to me!!! It was supposed to have been fixed. I've known about it forever, but I don't do it to people. But next time Amish, next time!
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
I know it's an exploit, but I love it. I personally hope it doesn't get fixed.

The reason you can scuttle it is (and I'm guessing) because the programming for the mines on a planet and neutral mines is the same, meaning you can scuttle them. Mines at planets can be rebuilt, neutral mines can't.

Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
Honestly, I think this is a fairly cool bug.

Why not give colony ships an additional 'construct mine' ability for 250cr and leave scuttling the way it is?
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

Awesome! I had no idea you could do that. Can't say I'd thought to do it but I like the idea. Is it good for the game? I can see the game ending up as one where one of the big strategies is to have the Vasari on your team knock out all of the neutral mines on the other side of the map while the opposing Vasari tries to do the same to the ones on your side, resulting in a map without any neutrals. But hey, all's fair in love and war, right?
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
give colony ships an additional 'construct mine' ability
End of quote


It may be a problem with the neutral mines being in the middle of nowhere. I have often wondered why you would find fully operation mines already built in space. I am going to take a wild guess here and assume it has something to do with how the game engine operates. What was fixed if IIRC is that you can no long destroy these mines by attacking them, in that way they are invunerable.

Are they supposed to be invunerable from destruction, once you have taken control of them? or Are they intended to be a bonus resources that trade hands when the territory shifts?

I personally would like to see this as being more of a hosts rules kind of thing where what is allowable as far as the neutral mines goes, is agreeable upon by the players prior to the game. Then it can be played either way.